It appears that when the Katalon TestOps plugin executes the Katalon Engine (katalonc) the new process isn't executed with the same environment configuration as the underlying Jenkins job.

We use the Custom Tools plugin to provide the Chrome binary to any job that needs it.
This adds the path to the directory with the Chrome binary to the PATH environment variable and moreover it creates a separate environment variable (in our case Chrome_HOME) with the same path.

When the Katalon Engine is executed via the Katalon TestOps plugin, the Chrome Driver can't find the Chrome binary unless we specify the full path to it in the project settings (Desired Capabilities > Web UI > Chrome: binary).

However when we simulate the execution of the Katalon Engine manually from the shell on the same Jenkins slave (simply by copying the executed command from the Jenkins job log) with the PATH environment variable set identically to what's set for the Jenkins job, the Chrome binary is sucessfully found on the PATH and the test runs as expected.

Therefore it appears that when the engine is executed via the plugin, the environment is reset (not inherited).

It would be much easier if the environment was inherited so that Jenkins job environment settings could be used by the Katalon Engine. This would improve the portability since we wouldn't have to use full path to the Chrome binary in the project settings.
It could be implemented as an option, disabled by default in order to keep the default behavior unchanged.